Waubeek Wayside Traditional Cache
redfoxbolt: sorry to those looking for it and did not find
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Difficulty:
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Size: 
(small)
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A quick park and grab
The hill to the north is Waubeek Mound. The word Waubeek came from the Ojibwa Indian language and means “big rock hill”. This area played a part in Native American History thousand of years before the Europeans came.
The Village of Waubeek was located on the west side of the Chippewa River, north of the Durand Rod and Gun Club. The Village, platted in 1854, served as a center for the early lumbering in the area.
In 1855, Cadwallader Washburn bought 12,000 acres of pine land along the Chippewa River. C. C. Washburn went on to serve as brigadier general in the Civil War, 3 terms as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives (1855-1861), Governor of Wisconsin (1872-1874), and started the General Mills Company in St. Paul/Minneapolis, MN. He hired Burrage Downs, founder of Downsville, to build a boom and sawmill at Waubeek. The mill was the largest steam operated mill in Wisconsin prior to the Civil War and it employed up to 100 men. The mill burned in 1871 and was never rebuilt. The Village of Waubeek, during its prime, consisted of a hotel big enough for 50 people, livery stable, store, Baptist Church and houses both in the river bottoms and on the hill. After the mill burned, Waubeek became more dependant on the river boat, the “Phil Sheckel” for its existence. The steamboat, designed by Phil Sheckel for shallow rivers would take lumber rafts down the Chippewa River to Readings Landing and bring supplies and lumbermen back to Waubeek. The supplies were then taken to Menomonie mills by wagon. Phil Sheckel, born in Luxemburg, Germany in 1834, became know as the “Mark Twain” of the Chippewa River. The steamboat made its last trip down the Chippewa River in 1896. It went down the Mississippi and was used to haul supplies in the Florida Keys. The anchor and bronze marker are in the park in Pepin, Wisconsin. A flood around 1900 brought an end to what remained of Waubeek. The 13 streets and Public Square, today consist of trees, brush, rocks and pilings. (Waubeek Comp Plan)
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
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